Mobile communication devices, such as battery powered mobile telephones, generally operate over cellular networks of service providers utilizing, for example, GSM and CDMA protocols. However, with the advent of Internet-based methods, many mobile communication devices come equipped with multiple transceivers for communication over different types of networks such as wireless fidelity (WiFi) or wireless local area network (WLAN) in addition to GSM and CDMA networks, depending upon preferences and efficiencies. Dual-mode mobile communication devices leverage the ubiquity of wide-area networks (GSM and CDMA) with the high performance and low operational costs of local-area WiFi networks. WiFi “hot spots,” are currently limited to offices or homes, coffee shops, airports and neighborhood area networks. It is expected that the hotspots will expand their reach as more systems are installed. A user of a mobile communication device may roam in and out of a plurality of wide-area networks and WiFi networks.
When in range of a WiFi network, a mobile communication device may therefore switch from its cellular network service provider to the WiFi network. The mobile communication device effectively registers with the WiFi network which in turn uses its Internet address as a node, or processing location, for the communication device. Thus, as the user moves to different WiFi hotspots, the mobile communication device can register with different WiFi networks having different IP addresses. The telephone number of the mobile communication device is effectively posted in either a centralized server network or a peer-to-peer network so that the IP address associated with the telephone number may be retrieved.
When initiating contact with a roaming mobile communication device that has an IP address, albeit a temporary IP address, the caller can search the Internet for the roaming device's IP address. Searching the Internet for the IP address of a roaming device can take time and therefore can delay initiating communication. It would be beneficial if the delay of initiating communication with a device, particularly a device with a changing IP address, were reduced.